Sickness in the spring

I think that spring and summer are the worst times to be sick.  Hanna woke up this morning with a sore throat and stuffy nose (she was running around yesterday without shoes on outside before I caught her).  she has also been around more people than usual this past week.  No wonder kids in public school get sick so much.  My kids have usually been pretty healthy.  Except when they are exposed to more people than usual.  So today is a take it easy day for Hannah.  She will spend the day watching educational tv and dvds and reading.   

A trip to Susquehannock Park

While Dave was home last week we took an afternoon and went to a local park to watch the birds.  This particular park has an overlook so you can view the eagles, ospreys and turkey vultures.  We think that most of the birds we saw were turkey vultures.

This was taken by Hannah.  She has a good eye.

Definately a Turkey vulture!!

 

200th post

According to the little counter this is my 200th post.  I know that some blogs give away things etc for various anniversaries but unfortunately I cannot afford to do that right now because of the recent situation with my husband.  I can direct you to a fabulous giveaway from Tyndale house though.

If you have a facebook account you can go to www.facebook.com/NewLivingTranslation and click on the sweepstakes tab and enter win some really great prizes.  If you don't have a facebook account you can go to http://biblecontest.newlivingtranslation.com/index.php and enter to win a trip to Hawaii.  Just for entering you get a free mp3 or Bible study

Good luck if you enter. 

Day to myself

I will have the majority of the day to myself today because Hannah will be going to the church to help make Chocolate covered Easter Eggs.  I plan on reading for most of the day. 
David is doing well with his orientation and found out from the doctor yesterday that if he had remained in the other job that he would probably be looking at a hernia operation within the next couple of years.  god has made what was bad into a good thing like He so often does. 
I spent a good bit of time yesterday looking into other peoples blogs and looking at different ways to get books to review.  Blogging for books is a great way for me to feed my addiction to books without costing me anything but time. 

Chronological Guide to the Bible

See my review for this book here

A Praying Life by Paul Miller

See my review for this book here

And so the new adventure begins

My hubby got a new job!!!  He made the decision on Friday and all the arrangements were made for him to go to Columbus Ohio for his orientation.  He took a bus yesterday morning.  We had to go up to Reading, PA to pick up his ticket.  After Christmas I started buying gift cards for various restaurant (it is difficult for us to go out for a nice dinner if we have to come up with the money all at once but if I pick up a gift card here and there it isn't so much of a dent).  So we went to TGI Friday's as a celebration, only paying out $5 to go toward the tip, using the left over balance on the cards for the rest of the tip.  Afterward we went up to visit my husband's sister who we really enjoy visiting. 
Daughter will be spending much of the next week at the church making chocolate eggs.  They make peanut butter and cocoanut and sell them to benefit the youth group mission trips.  They are really delicious.   

Patience

That is something both my husband and I are learning. He with the looking and process of job hunting.  Me with him.  It is difficult when Hannah and I are in a routine and someone comes along and decides to "help" and turns our world upside down.  So we are in the process of finding things after he has cleaned.  I do appreciate him doing this for me but it takes awhile to get back into a rhythm.  He has gone out for the morning at least to give us back a part of our routine.     

a Major Upheaval

Without going into too much detail my Husband finds himself looking for a new job this week.  We have  had several ups and downs this weekend and he finds himself  going through the whole process of applications and interviews.  I have no doubt that he will have a new job by the end of the week at the latest and that things will  be semi back to normal by the beginning of next month.   The circumstances that lead to this change are both ridiculous and actually a blessing in disguise.  The blessing part is that his job was taking a major toll on his body but he would never have left it on his own.  I won't get into the ridiculous part other than it is a product of the way the current legal system makes it so easy for someone to sue (which we could do twice over if we wanted to but have chosen just to let it go).   All prayers for our current situation and for the upcoming transition would be greatly appreciated.

As I have confessed  here to being a major book-a-holic.  I got my weekly email from Heart of the Matter (which you should subscribe) and the main subject was how to cultivate a love of reading in your children.  Some of the advice I have done with my children and you will find that you may already know but it just nice to see others using it with success.

Cultivating Readers,   Free children's books downloads, Encouraging a love of Literature were some of the articles I found interesting.

Another article was about setting a goal for ourselves to read great literature.  That article is here.

As a mother of a child who has always read way beyond her years I found this article about keeping up with an accelarated reader very interesting.  I always found it difficult to find books that Hannah would find enjoyable at her reading level.  (She has read at aobve 12 grade level since 3rd grade).

  

A Challenge ahead of Us

Without getting into to much detail my husband will be starting a new job on Monday.  It will be a bit hard financially for a week or two but then once we are over the bump we should be okay.  We are going to have to postpone our Disney trip probably until October because we will need the money we would have used for it to help get us over this bump.  Oh well I will keep planning. 

Disappointment

Just got a text from my hubby telling me that he won't make it home until tomorrow.  He has been gone for almost two weeks now and I was really looking forward to him making it home for some quality family time.  Oh well He will be home by lunch tomorrow hopefully and he won't have to leave again until Sunday (crossing my fingers)  such is the life of a truck drivers wife.    

66 Love Lettes by Larry Crabb

See my review A Room Without Books is Empty

A little frustrated.

I am a little frustrated with my youngest today.  I had quite a long talk with her about her responsiblities around the house yesterday, as a matter of fact the subject was brought up several times throughout the day as I brought up examples as they presented themselves.  I asked her to do a certain chore as I left for work last night and I had told her I wanted her to do this chore earlier in the day before she went to bed.  When I got home from work the chore was still not done.  She is 14 and quite capable to do what I had asked her to do.  So I guess that she will not be going skating with her friends tonight, will not be going online for personal use today and not watching tv tonight.  Sigh.  I hate when my children force my hand and need to be disciplined.

I have several homeschooling links to share with you today.

Currclick's freebie is quite an extensive unit study on the Human body. You  may have gotten this if you ordered her bargain last week in the link I posted but if not here is a chance to get a really great unit study .  The link is here.

Becky over at Homeschooling at Hospitality Lane posted a great link for vocabulary.  It can be found here.  Check out Becky's blog too.

Hannah is reading Treasure Island so I found this link very interesting.  I got it from Home school freebie of the day newsletter.  The direct link is here.  The homeschool freebie are several links for audio version of old radio shows , a pdf of the book and the unit study.    While you are there why not sign up for their newsletter.

If your child is an audio learning your may be interested in some link for audio books.  Florida has a program called Lit2go.  Here you will find and abundance of poems and books just waiting for you to download and listen.  It gives you listings for grade and reading level.  The link is here

LearnOutLoud.com has just recently added a listing of over 1000 books from Librivox.org.  Librivox records public domain books and has them available for download.  These are done by volunteers so the quality varies but this list will give you plenty to sift through.  The link is here.

I have other links that I will list in another post but these should get you started.     

DVD boxed sets

-I have become addicted to buying boxed sets of tv shows that I love.  Amazon just makes it to easy.  I recently have bought Little House on the Prairie season one.  I have all the Waltons plus the movies that they made after the series ended.  I also have season one of I Love Lucy and the Dick Van Dyke show.  With nothing much on tv worth watching these days it is nice to sit back and relax and watch familiar friendly shows. Even though I know that I have watched these episodes I don't remember several of them and it feels like I am watching brand new tv.   My youngest also loves Lucy and recently she has taken up watching clips of Carol Burnett on YouTUbe (some of these are uncensored so she's not allowed to watch those) (I wish they offered this series in boxed sets). She also has been getting The Monkees on her Netflix (remember when ever Davey saw a girl he liked he'd get those sparkles in his eyes.)    I also bought the series of Boy Meets World, the whole series all 17 DVD's.  I have been buying most of them used.  I check the sellers rating at Amazon and I haven't had any problems yet.  I rotate the series so I don't get tired of them to soon.  I also plan on getting the next season when I am done with the one I have.  

That probably explains the state of my house.  I will admit I am not a great housekeeper.  I always say that the house looks lived in but right now it really just looks like a tornado went through.  I will be cleaning over the next several days to make sure that it is nice and clean for when my hubby gets home.  Sigh.                                                                                                         

Picked up Elena yesterday

I took Hannah to the Humane League and we picked up our newest member of the family Elena yesterday.

She has adjusted well and has done well with the litter and finding her food.  She is still exploring every nook and crany of her new home but she is a very affectionate cat and loves to snuggle with you when you are sitting or as Hannah found out last night as you are sleeping. We have to take her to the vet tomorrow as we are required to according to the adoption papers we signed.  

We here in southern Lancaster county are expecting another 6-12 inches according to the weatherman.  I personally was glad when the snow from the blizzard had finally started to melt and we could see the ground again.  I love the first snow of the winter but can do with out the rest of the winter.  

  

Help out a fellow homeschooler.

I received an email from a fellow homeschooler who is selling her materials on Curriclick for a drastic price cut to help to pay for a trip her family wants to take to help another family when a member dies.  I just got finished downloading all of the lnks and I have to say it is well worth the price of only 12.10

The Link is here.

While you are there check out the free stuff they have available.

Meet The newest member of the family!!!

My daughter has been wanting a dog for quite some time but we were not certain that she could handle the responsibility so my hubby took her to the Humane League and this is the adorable kitty that she picked out as we figure cats are a little bit less responsiblity.  We will see how she handles the cat then we will be looking at dobs probably at the end of the year.  We didn't bring her home as she hasn't been spayed yet.  We will pick her up on Tuesday.  Hannah hasn't named her yet.  She is about 3 years old and very affectionate.

My hubby will be home this weekend which will be nice.  It is lonely when he is away.

Some homeschool freebies that I came across today  are Free world U which is a free curriculm that uses flashcards to help your students remeber what they are learning.  Looks interesting what I saw of it.  

Tin Can Knitting looks like an interesting way to knit and looks perfect for teen age girls.

Hands of a Child  is offering a free lapbook package about the First Ladies.  

I received some links that are new to me for free audio books.  These are all classics.  I have found that sometimes when I have a difficult time reading a book i can listen to it and find it very enjoyable.  These are all done by volunteers so are not profession but most of them are very good. 

http://thoughtaudio.com/

http://www.ejunto.org/

http://librivox.org/

   

Oh what a winter we have had

This winter seems to just keep giving.  After the 24 inches we had last weekend and add to that the 29 inches we received during the blizzard this past week,  we are to receive another 4-8 inches tomorrow night into Tuesday.  I already took 3 days off last week and really do not want to take anymore time off but the drifting snow may just keep me home like it did this morning from church.  Woke up and got ready for church then decided to check out face book and low and behold there was a notice that the road we take to church was drifted shut.  There was an alternate way but I was not sure about it so we decided to stay home. 

These are trees infront of our house.  Yes trees not bushes.

 

Yes I knew there was a car under there somewhere.

My hubby is in Arizona and went to a museum and saw some old west things.  Here are some Pics that he sent me.

 

That's one Handsome gunfighter (my hubby)

And here are some of the Valentine's he sent me in my email

Isn't he just the sweetest Hubby. 

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!!

Round Three

Make a Smilebox slideshow

winter Storm number 3